My thought before reading this was that I was not sure I was ready for this one. I do believe that when I first read it online there was quite a lot of skimming going on, and so, I really had to prevent myself fro doing that this time.

And, I was right, this one took me a lot longer than it should have to read. Especially when I got to Chapter Seven or so. After that it was a bit easier to read, because it was more about rebuilding than about destruction, but, those first chapters. First anticipating what was going to happen on the date of 9/11/2001, and then reading what happened. Can 17 years still be too soon?

But, all that has to do with what I was feeling while reading it, not with the actual book. The actual book is just as good as all her others in this series, if not better in some ways.

Dar and Kerry and everyone are trying to rebuild in the direct aftermath of 9/11. Trying to keep ILS's systems up, while also rebuilding a network in one of the most important cities on the East Coast, oh, and trying to get the Pentagon back up and running too. Not to mention, through all this, sparring with the government over and over. Oh, and Dar and Kerry are trying to get to one another as well.

As I implied above, it was an intense and emotional book. And while I know there are some readers who don't like the amount of techy stuff that happened during this book. But, I thought that all the stuff they were talking about on their Central Board/IM thingie was super interesting, and I'm not going to pretend that I understood all or most of it, but, the stuff I did was fun to read (yes, in fact, I do play a nerd in my life). I thought it gave the novel a depth and verisimilitude.

Oh, and I want to end the review with a quote that I felt was just perfect when it came to how I personally felt while living thorugh 9/11. A minor character, a Chief in the Military says, "Have you ever wanted to hit someone, but you ain't got a target, young lady? I just want to find the people who thought this was a great and noble thing to do and keep hitting them until their guts come out on the floor." ( )